The Death of the Demo Tape (At Last)

by Dave Mandl

Even more than their counterparts in the publishing world, giant record
labels have long enjoyed a near-monopoly on the means of producing,
distributing, and publicizing people's creative work. Along with this
monopoly comes the freedom to decide what is and isn't worthy of release,
and consequently to define the very rules of the game. This industry
stranglehold determines a lot more than simply which bands get money to put
out records and which don't: the drive to "make it"--to get signed to a
major label--has always had an enormous effect on everything from the
clothes and haircuts bands wear, to what they say in interviews, to minute
details of the structure of their songs. The influence of the majors, while
not always obvious, has been all-pervasive, and countless musical artists
have fallen under their sway merely by following the received rules of the
business. Of course, with no other options, many have chosen to play
along--using their time and energy to court record companies and make the
kind of music that they are most likely to take notice of; either way, the
results have been stunted creative growth and, especially, mountains of
bland, formulaic output--the product of self-censorship and compromise.

But all that is changing. At the same time that the revolution in
self-publishing has allowed anyone with a couple of stamps and access to an
office xerox machine to declare herself a publisher--free from the
constraints of the respectable print world--the advent of the cassette
studio has liberated the musical masses from the nightmare world of demo
tapes, press kits, and $150-an-hour recording sessions. With the freedom to
produce and control one's own recordings also comes freedom from censorship
and self-censorship--and altogether new forms of audio expression.

Just as there is no point in being a journalist without a newspaper to
publish your writing, unsigned musicians--that is, artists with no clear
avenue to release their work--historically had no real reason to make
recordings as ends in themselves; when valuable studio time could be scored,
it was used to produce demo tapes. Since the goal of most bands was getting
signed (in order to make records), and since the major labels had nearly
complete control of record production and distribution, budding artists
often spent years making demos and shopping them around to representatives
of these labels, in the hope that one would show interest and eventually
offer them a contract. Much money and effort were expended in compiling
names and addresses of people who might be looking for new talent, and
shipping tapes off to them. With such a strong desire (and need) simply to
be accepted by an industry figure, young aspirants assembled these tapes
with the utmost care. There were books of advice written on the subject: how
many songs to include on the tape, the best sequence for them, how to put
together an accompanying press kit, etc. As for the music, any band knew
what the basic musical and lyrical formulas were, who the current hot
artists to emulate were, and what styles record companies were interested in
at any given time. Needless to say, the vast majority of demos were rejected
(and often not even listened to).

But concentrating so completely on the demo-making process often meant
devoting most of one's time to learning the tricks of the trade, to studying how
the industry prefers things, rather than experimenting and developing musically
(a luxury denied even to many big money-makers). The band's primary mission often
became "trying to get signed," rather than creating new music (and while
ostensibly bossless, most bands were in effect working for the boss--for no
pay--all the time). It was not unusual to see a long-surviving band go through
multiple, sudden transformations--progressive rock, folk, punk, new wave,
funk--as styles changed, keeping their record company feelers out all the while.
Paradoxically, as a band got closer to their elusive goal (after getting a nibble
from a record company), they often tried even harder to conform, not wanting to
make a wrong move and destroy the progress they had made so far--a gang of
starry-eyed nineteen-year-olds playing a command performance for the man with the
keys to the universe is not going to do anything foolish. In general,
experimentation (outside certain "safe," prescribed boundaries, which changed
slightly over time) was dangerous and not recommended. Most bands serious about
getting signed were aware of the basic rules, and careful not to violate them.
When a band did get signed, often after years of grueling work, they were not
eager to take a chance and risk losing it all. Like a dedicated young journalist
who would rather toe the line and keep her job than write hard-hitting stories
that no one will ever see, artists eventually internalized the rules--often
unconsciously--and kept their fingers crossed. Big record companies, by virtue of
their great power, defined the standards, which they scarcely needed to
enforce.

Their promotional arm, radio, has always been a big help, with its virtual
blackout of music that doesn't meet the industry's stringent criteria--and
just doesn't exist, for ninety-five percent of the population or the history
books. Even when, in the late seventies, the industry was forced to
acknowledge the punk movement (which offered a genuine challenge to the
ossified monopoly of the majors, and put the fear of God in them, if only
for a few short years), the radio world continued to view music through the
eyes of the big labels. (To a smaller degree, this is also true of the music
press, where even tiny, marginal publications have their own personality
cults and star systems.) When radio shows spotlighting "independent" artists
began to appear, the latter were usually defined as bands that had not been
signed--that had been unjustly overlooked. One of the first such shows to
appear in New York City, for example, had the revealing name The No Major
Record Show--defining the featured artists by what they weren't, a stigma
like "single mother," "virgin," or "black female vocalist." (It was a good
sign, of course, that shows like this were appearing at all; no one would
even have thought of the idea before 1978 or so.)

Listening to these shows (which were in fact few, and limited to "hipper"
stations) was a lot like watching TV's Star Search, or a semi-pro baseball
game--forums where talented young performers could show their stuff for the
professional scouts they hoped were in the audience. The bands featured were
generally the ones that went by the book--the right instrumentation, the
right chords, the right lyrics--and the producer of at least one such show
in New York City made it clear that she wanted "rock 'n' roll only": that
is, bands that sounded just like everyone else; presumably, listeners could
hear the featured performances and bewail the injustice that had been done
to these hard-working souls who were, after all, no less deserving than the
other bands just like them that had been signed. So much for "alternative"
music...

But there was no denying the great possibilities inherent in the new
technology that allowed all this to happen. Just as the punk movement
created new musical models (though it was unfortunately absorbed to a great
extent by the majors themselves, who eventually adapted to the new
aesthetics and restored things to "normal"), the availability of inexpensive
home recording equipment gave more musicians than ever the opportunity to
try their hand at what was formerly the exclusive preserve of those with the
blessing of a record company. Perhaps more important, it gave this
opportunity to non-musicians--those who never would have thought seriously
about making music in the old world. With the new compact, inexpensive, and
easy-to-use multi-track cassette decks, anyone could put together a
serviceable recording studio at home for under $1000. And with the price of
forty-five minutes of chrome cassette tape hovering at around $2, compared
to at least $30 for an equivalent amount of the half-inch reel-to-reel item,
tape was as free as studio time. There was no longer any need to beg for a
few brief hours in the studio, or to do anything other than what you felt
like doing once the tape was rolling. People soon began stretching out and
trying things that would have been considered madness just a few years
earlier--or more likely, would never have crossed their minds. Before long,
it became apparent that there was nothing sacred about LPs. In fact, an
all-cassette format made more sense for many reasons: cassettes could be
duplicated easily and cheaply (one at a time if necessary); great individual
care could be given to their packaging and decoration; and they could be
distributed anywhere in the world via the public mails. The new medium also
made new approaches to recording possible: international mail collaborations
(with each participant contributing one track and sending the tape along);
cassette magazines; audio diaries and letters; home-spun musique concrète of
all descriptions; new mutated song-forms; and other angles never considered
by the old demo-tape generation. Far from being hobbled by explicit or
implicit censorship, cassette recordists were free to try anything they damn
well pleased. Some of it was awful, but some of it was brilliant, and most
of it was different. Instead of serving as part of a permanent volunteer
farm team for the record companies, the new cassette artists reclaimed their
independence and created a worldwide, decentralized communications web like
those of the parallel mail art and self-published 'zine networks--and laid
the foundation for a new autonomous world of sound.

Though many long-time cassette networkers have moved to vinyl or even CD as
those formats have become more accessible, the principles and spirit of the
network, if anything, have become stronger. Though the major labels are
still getting the airplay, shelf space, and money, a larger and larger chunk
of the total territory has been ceded to independent artists, operating in
the shadows, in home laboratories in unheard-of places not in the official
guidebook. As the price of the new recording technology continues to drop,
the grip of the majors--which once reached all the way from carefully staged
showcases in glitzy nightclubs to your fourteen-year-old nephew's
garage-metal band--will be further broken. I won't miss the old days.